Life in Soviet Union

choi

David Satter, On Life in the Soviet Police State. Wall Street Journal, May 4, 2013 (in ther column "Five Best: A personal choice).
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB ... 44701108977318.html

Note: Numbers correspond to the order of books introduced.
(1)
(a) Kolyma
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolyma
(gets its name from the Kolyma River and mountain range)
(b) Kolyma River
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolyma_River
(frozen to depths of several metres for about 250 days each year, becoming free of ice only in early June, until October; known for its Gulag labour camps and gold mining; The river gives its title to a famous anthology about life in Gulag camps by Varlam Shalamov, The Kolyma Tales)
(c) Varlam Shalamov
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varlam_Shalamov
(1907-1982; first arrest, 1929-1931, for joined a Trotskyist-leaning group; second arrest 1937-1951)

(3)
(a) Tibor Szamuely (historian)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibor_Szamuely_(historian)
(1925-1972; a nephew of Tibor Szamuely [1890-1919])
(b) Ivan the Terrible
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_the_Terrible
(Ivan IV 1530-1584; reign 1533-1584; known in English as Ivan the Terrible, from Russian lititerally "Fearsome;" section 3.2 Sack of Novgorod [in 1570])

(4) Holodomor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
(Ukraine for "extermination by hunger;" 1932-1933; death estimation: modern consensus for a likely total of 3–3.5 million)